You note that many successful people are up and running before dawn — like Al Sharpton, who apparently hits the gym while most of us are still snoozing. And you counsel that using those hours presents a great opportunity to get ahead. What can a productive morning yield?

Mornings are a great time to get things done. First, people are less likely to interrupt you. Second, research into willpower finds that your ability to have self-discipline is strongest in the morning after a good night’s sleep. It gets depleted over the course of the day as we make decisions and as we deal with annoying colleagues and bickering children.

What can people do in the morning to help their careers?

Morning is a good time for strategic thinking about your career. Many of us spend much of our work hours responding to e-mails, dealing with conference calls, going to meetings — all things that are dealing with what’s immediately happening. It doesn’t leave a whole lot of time for taking the long term view.

Mornings are a good time to figure out what you’d like your career to look like in the future. What are the big problems facing your organization? What are some ways that you could move your career and your organization forward?

How should a late-nighter like Keith Richards make the transition to morning person?

There’s some percentage of the population, Keith Richards included, that are confirmed night owls. And those people are going to be better off doing what they want to do later in the evening. The problem is the work world expects people to be awake and alert at eight or nine in the morning. With good habits, you can become more of a morning person.

Part of that is keeping track of your time and looking at how you’re spending your evenings. Some of us aren’t spending our evenings in a way that’s aligned with our priorities, or that’s even all that enjoyable. And if you’ve been going to bed at midnight, try moving [back] by 10 or 15 minutes at a time and see if you can get used to it. Over a couple of weeks or months, you could move your bedtime by an hour or even more.

What are your tips for organizing a morning?

Figure out what you need to have with you to make it happen, and set those things out so you’re not looking around for them in the morning. You’ll lose your motivation. If you’re planning on doing strategic thinking, it helps to have identified what problems you’d like to think about ahead of time and gather the materials you need. Keep track of how many days you’re doing it. Keep track of how you’re feeling. And feel free to reward yourself for a while if you’re trying to build a habit.

Eventually habits produce their own motivation because you’re excited about the changes that are happening in your life, but until that happens, you’re going to need some support and external reward, even if it’s just a sticker on a chart.

How many hours do people need between the time they wake up and the time they get to work?